2A - The Michigan Daily - Monday, March 27, 2006
NATION/WORLD-
Marines on body
armor: Thanks,
but no thanks
TO some, extra 5
pounds of armor not
worth additional safety
HUSAYBAH, Iraq (AP) - Extra
body armor - the lack of which
caused a political storm in the United
States - has flooded in to Iraq, but
many Marines here promptly stuck it
in lockers or under bunks. Too heavy
and cumbersome, many say.
Marines already carry loads as
heavy as 70 pounds when they patrol
the dangerous streets in towns and vil-
lages in restive Anbar province. The
new armor plates, while only about
five pounds each, are not worth carry-
ing for the additional safety they are
said to provide, some say.
"We have to climb over walls and
go through windows," said Sgt. Justin
Shank of Greencastle, Pa. "I under-
stand the more armor, the safer you
are. But it makes you slower. People
don't understand that this is combat
and people are going to die."
Staff Sgt. Thomas Bain of Buffalo,
N.Y., shared concerns about the extra
pounds.
"Before you know it, they're going
to get us injured because we're haul-
ing too much weight and don't have
enough mobility to maneuver in a fight
from house to house," said Bain, who
is assigned to the 3rd Battalion, 6th
Marine Regiment. "I think we're start-
ing to go overboard on the armor."
Since the insurgency erupted in Iraq,
the Pentagon has been criticized for
supplying insufficient armor for Hum-
vees and too few bulletproof vests. In
one remarkableincident, soldiers pub-
licly confronted Secretary of Defense
Donald Rumsfeld about the problem
on live television.
Hometown groups across the United
States have since raised money to send
extra armor to troops, and the Penta-
gon, under congressional pressure,
launched a program last October to
reimburse troops who had purchased
armor with their own money.
Soldiers and their parents spent hun-
dreds, sometimes thousand of dollars,
on armor until the Pentagon began
issuing the new protective gear.
In Bain's platoon of about 35 men,
Marines said only three or four wore
the plates after commanders distribut-
ed them last month and told them that
use was optional.
Top military officials, including
Secretary of the Army Francis Harvey,
acknowledge the concerns over weight
and mobility but have urged that the
new gear be mandatory.
"That's going to add weight, of
course," said Harvey. "You've read
where certain soldiers aren't happy
about that. But we think it's in their
best interest to do this."
Marines have shown a special aver-
sion to the new plates because they
tend to patrol on foot, sometimes
conducting two patrols each day that
last several hours. They feel the extra
weight.
NEWS IN BRIEF
WASHINGTON
Report: Russians fed intel to Saddam
k Iraqi documents captured by U.S. forces in 2003 say Russian intelligence had
sources inside the American military that enabled it to feed information about U.S.
troop movements and battle plans to Saddam Hussein.
The unclassified report does not assess the value or accuracy of the information Sad-
dam got or offer details on Russia's information pipeline. It cites captured Iraqi docu-
ments that say the Russians had "sources inside the American Central Command" and
that intelligence was passed to Saddam through the Russian ambassador in Baghdad.
Maria Zakharova, spokeswoman for Russia's U.N. mission in New York, said
the allegations were false.
"To my mind, from my understanding it's absolutely nonsense and it's ridicu-
lous,' she said, adding that the U.S. government had not shown Russia the evidence
cited in the report. "Somebody wants to say something, and did - and there is no
evidence to prove it."
v ~KIEV, Ukraine
Exit olls show pro-Russian party in lead
A pro-Russia party won the largest chunk of votes in Ukraine's parliamentary
{4,elections yesterday, two nationwide exit polls indicated, dealing a stinging rebuke to
- President Viktor Yushchenko's West-leaning administration.
Polling stations shut after 15 hours, but voters who had waited in long lines and managed
to get inside before the official closing time were allowed to cast ballots, choosing from more
than 45 parties that sought seats in the 450-member parliament.
One exit poll said 33 percent of votes had gone to the Party of the Regions led by
Viktor Yanukovych, a Kremlin ally who lost to Yushchenko in the 2004 presidential
election forced by the Orange Revolution street protests.
AP PHOTO The poll, by Democratic Initiatives, International Institute of Sociology and
Abdul Rahman, an Afghan man who converted from Islam to Christianity, is Razumkov Center, said former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko's bloc was second
interviewed during a hearing in Kabul on March 16. Rahman, who faced a possible with about 23 percent and Yushchenko's Our Ukraine party was third at under 14
death sentence for converting from Islam to Christianity, Is expected to be freed. percent.
DAKAR, Senegal
Blacklist highlights trouble in African skies
C h n st an Co ~ e(Citinc efat nn-n th E7rn U nin bnnr dQ9 ailin Wdrne
0
6
0
case dismissed
'Class of Katrina'
shares final dance
Despite ravages of
hurricane, prom goes on
at Gulf Coast schools
PASS CHRISTIAN, Miss. (AP)
- Wearing a canary yellow strapless
evening gown, Jessica Jenkins walked
across the remains of her home, rais-
ing her petticoat to keep it out of the
red clay.
Prom season holds a special impor-
tance for Jenkins and other Gulf
Coast students whose last year of
high school was defined by Hurricane
Katrina.
"The littlest things get to you now,"
said Jenkins, who was named the
prom queen Saturday. "Things that
you would never have thought would
bother you before the storm, bother
you now."
Next to the site of her old home,
where their new house is under con-
struction, Jenkins and older sister
Leah share a trailer supplied by the
Federal Emergency Management
Agency. Her parents and younger sis-
ter Brett live in an adjacent trailer. At
one time, they all shared one trailer,
with a white maltese and golden
haired poodle.
"You have a lot of rough mornings
trying to get ready in a FEMA trail-
er," she said.
Before Saturday's prom, she had to
apply her makeup in the trailer's dim
lighting while a bulldozer cleared
debris from a nearby lot.
She and her classmates from Pass
Christian High have been attending
school in portable classrooms set up
on the campus of the local elementary
school. Enrollment was down from
600 students last year to 420.
Other senior classes from Pass
Christian have had their proms at a
venue in downtown Gulfport but it,
too, was damaged by the storm, so
Saturday's party for the Class of 2006
was moved to the Orange Grove Com-
munity Center off scenic U.S. 49, next
to the Kangaroo Gas Station.
Senior Ryan Spear was shocked the
school could hold a prom at all, much
less have it ready on time.
"It isn't bittersweet. It's just sweet,"
fellow senior Heidi Knight said. "Hav-
ing one just makes you feel normal."
They got some assistance from far
away, as six students from Pennsyl-
vania's State College High School
came to help them decorate and oth-
ers in the central Pennsylvania town
donated 150 formal dresses for the
Pass Christian seniors.
Court's move paves
way for release of
Afghan man who
converted from Islam
KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) - A
court yesterday dismissed the case
against an Afghan man facing possible
execution for converting from Islam to
Christianity, officials said, paving the
way for his release.
The move eased pressure from
the West but raised the dilemma of
protecting Abdul Rahman after his
release as Islamic clerics have called
for him to be killed.
One official said freedom might
come as soon as today for Rahman,
who became a Christian in the 1990s
while working for an aid group in
neighboring Pakistan.
Muslim extremists, who have
demanded death for Rahman as an
apostate for rejecting Islam, warned
the decision would touch off protests
across this religiously conservative
country. Some clerics previously
vowed to incite Afghans to kill Rah-
man if he was let go.
Rahman was moved to Kabul's
notorious high-security Policharki
prison Friday after inmates at a jail in
central Kabul threatened him, Polich-
arki's warden, Gen. Shahmir Amir-
pur, said.
Authorities have barred journalists
from seeing Rahman. But yesterday,
officials gave AP an exclusive tour of
Policharki, which houses some 2,000
inmates, including about 350 Taliban
and al-Qaida militants.
Amirpur said Rahman had been
asking guards for a Bible but they had
none to give him.
"He looks very calm. But he keeps
saying he is hearing voices," Amirpur
said.
Rahman was in solitary confine-
ment in a tiny concrete cell next to a
senior prison guard's office. AP was
shown the cell door, but barred from
speaking with or otherwise communi-
cating with him.
A senior guard said inmates and
many guards had not been told of
Rahman's identity because of fears
they might attack him.
But Amirpur vouched for the pris-
oner's safety. "We are watching him
constantly. This is a very sensitive
case so he needs high security."
The case set off an outcry in the
United States and other nations that
helped oust the hard-line Taliban
regime in late 2001 and provide aid
and military support for Afghan Pres-
ident Hamid Karzai. President Bush
and others insisted Afghanistan pro-
tect personal beliefs.
A Supreme Court spokesman,
Abdul Wakil Omeri, said the case
had been dismissed because of "prob-
lems with the prosecutors' evidence."
He said several of Rahman's relatives
testified he is mentally unstable and
prosecutors have to "decide if he is
mentally fit to stand trial."
Another Afghan official closely
involved with the case told The
Associated Press that the court ruled
there was insufficient evidence and
returned the case to prosecutors for
further investigation. But he said
Rahman would be released in the
meantime.
t tng sa ety concerns te E uropean union nanneay airlnes weanes-
day from its airspace. Most of the airlines are from Africa, where planes
are six times likelier to crash than elsewhere and travelers swap tales of
crises averted.
In announcing the ban on virtually all aircraft overseen by civil aviation
authorities in Sierra Leone, Liberia, Equatorial Guinea, Swaziland and Congo
from landing at European airports, EU Transport Commissioner Jacques
Barrot labeled many of the planes "flying coffins."
Wednesday's ban and earlier similar orders rankle many Africans. They
point out that most of the banned airlines - like Thom's Airways from Congo
- no longer operate and never fly to Europe anyway, while Africans have
little choice but to use them to hop around the world's poorest continent.
BAGHDAD
30 bodies, most beheaded, found near Baghdad
Iraqi forces found 30 bodies, most beheaded, near a village north of Baghdad yester-
day, in one of the bloodiest episodes in a cycle of apparent sectarian killings.
Police said the bodies were found after police and soldiers were dispatched to respond
to a report of killings in Mullah Eid, a village near the town of Buhriz, a former strong-
hold of ex-President Saddam Hussein's Baath Party about 35 miles north of Baghdad.
Authorities gave no immediate information on the identities of the victims or on who
may have been responsible.
CORRECTIONS - Compiled from Daily wire reports
A caption on Friday's front page misidentified the swimmer in the photograph as
Peter Vanderkaay. The image was of his brother, Alex Vanderkaay.
A caption on Friday's page three misidentified the subject of the photograph as Chi-
nese calligrapher Haji Noor Deen. The man in the photogwas Ihsan Toabi, a visitor of
the exhibition.
Please report any error in the Daily to corrections@,michigandaily.com.
Ghbe ffiirbtw Di1
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